Of Bodies and Re-Formations

Though I do not endorse the movie, during one scene in Fight Club, Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt) looks at Jack (Edward Norton) while standing in a bus and comments on a Calvin Klein advertisement showing a man with rock-solid abs:

“Is that what a man looks like?”

Jack responds with a smirk. To the two of them, the poster resembles structuralist consumerism’s monopoly on image and gender. While indeed it may represent just that, I think it represents so much more. In the news today, a new surgical procedure promises perfect abs to its patients through “abdominal etching.” Apparently washboard abs are all the rage these days and instead of being the result of many hours in the gym and a disciplined diet, they can now be purchased. You can now live up to Calvin Klein’s expectations. Good news if your stomping grounds happen to be territories of the business world and not those of your local gym.

Of course, this is part of a much larger movement that is dead set on making everyone into supermodels and pornstars. This movement has been well-documented and analyzed before, so there’s nothing new here. But I believe today it serves us as a good reminder of the other reformation going on that has little to do with Martin Luther.

How are we supposed to read the poster in the bus? How do we interpret and understand the surging cosmetic surgery industry? And what does it have to do with reformation? There’s much to be said of how this relates to identity and certainly much more to be said of what C.S. Lewis rightly recognized as an over-indulgence of the sex appetite, but I’ll leave those topics for another time. It’s 2007, not 1517, and I believe this has everything to do with reformation.

In a world permeated with sin and cursed with death, even a secular world that lives in the here and now cries out for a reformation; a re-formation of the body. As Christians we know that we have been given a foretaste of this re-formation (regeneration) with the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit. We are a new creation now while not yet entirely. At the same time, God is working to redeem the whole of the cosmos from an enemy that Christ has defeated (death).

Think in terms of generation, degeneration, regeneration, and consummation. God created the cosmos (generation), we cursed it (degeneration), Christ redeemed it (regeneration), and God will make it new (consummation).

When we see an ad from Abercrombie & Fitch or a doctor’s office selling improvements on the body, it has much more to do with eschatology than we might think. Perfect abs and liposuction are a poor substitute for the resurrection, but that’s exactly what they are. The world admits that our bodies are cursed when they seek to overcome an enemy that only Christ can overcome.

As we look forward to the coming resurrection of the body and restoration of all things in Christ, we can put industries like that of cosmetic surgery into proper focus. We live in a world that cries out for a savior, is terrified of death, and acknowledges sin unwittingly through the repudiation of imperfect bodies.

Tyler and Jack were right to read the picture beyond what it desired them to, but they didn’t really get the point. Death surely comes to us all, but not so with age. Should we have the privilege of many years on this earth, our wrinkles and so-so abs (if any at all) should serve as a reminder of how much we have been blessed. They should terrify us as we consider our stewardship of that time. Yet they should also cause us to laugh in the face of an enemy that we all must face, knowing that the battle has already been won.

6 Responses

Very interesting post Tyler. As we celebrate Reformation Day, we need to remind ourselves of the depraved world we live in and we need to think about the big-picture of redemption–I think your post did that!

Thanks for an excellent first post Tyler–I am excited to have you writting with us!

Certainly a timely, interesting post. Truth that some of the Emergents (e.g. Pagitt) don’t quite get. Truth is, the hope of redemption is for Christians, the exchange of Christ’s righteousness of our sins and our sins for Christ’s righteousness. To those who cry out for a Savior, but look back to temporary fixes (cosmetic surgeries) or false-gospels, not redemption . . . instead eternal separation, hell.

Not entirely sure of Pagitt’s theology here, but in his interview with Todd Friel, he suggested that when a good Buddhist dies, he will interact with God in the same way that God will interact with a Christian. When pushed further, Pagitt simply responded that God will get rid of that which messed things up (sin) and make that person into a new creature, like they were meant to be. Didn’t seem to have much to do with atonement, Christ.

Long comment short . . . we are saved by grace—by the sovereign, pursuing, confronting grace of God given to those who believe Christ. Too many cloud the waters, trying to reconcile God’s good work to restore creation, to re-form it and kill evil, while doing that don’t mark the distinction . . . without Christ, the Lord of all, and his salvation given by God, applied by the Holy Spirit, and told about in Scripture—without that, we have no hope. We can only laugh in the face of that enemy because we are Christ’s sheep. For the goats, there’ll be no laughing, no joy.

Tyler, thanks for your first post. It got me thinking a lot. Sorry to run it off on an ’emergent’ tangent, but maybe it’ll get some good conversation going about the nature of the restoration of all things in Creation, and the resurrection body.

Also, I thought this was interesting: you said, “The world admits that our bodies are cursed when they seek to overcome an enemy that only Christ can overcome . . . We live in a world that cries out for a savior, is terrified of death, and acknowledges sin unwittingly through the repudiation of imperfect bodies.” Don’t you find it sad that in their sin, even when acknowledging it, they deny God and try to fix it with more sin?

Thanks for the comments Kevin, and for sharing this blog with me. I definitely think there’s much more to be mined here and I do intend to follow it up further. The emergent aspect is anything but a tangent, it’s central to the debate over the engagement of/with culture. I certainly have more to come on these things, but I do hope they spark further conversation.

Sweet. Eventually, when I’m ready to type it all out, I’m planning on doing a review of Carson’s Becoming Conversant with the Emerging Church with updates brewing in the ‘conversation.’ Glad you’re blogging w/ us.

Not just central to engagement with culture, but the church, and truth. I think most of the attendance at emergent churches are disenchanted church attenders.

I get hung up trying to read books by emergents because they start out pointing out problems and truths that are real and biblical. Then they take off in a whole new direction. And when they won’t tell you what they believe, it’s hard to tell them they’re wrong.

The part about non-Christians substituting surgery, make-up, and obsessions with physical appearance for the Bible-hope of the resurrection is an awesome point. I’m going to look at it all differently now, and maybe try to talk to some non-Christians with that as a springboard. Sounds like a door open.
To God be all glory,
Lisa of Longbourn

“The part about non-Christians substituting surgery, make-up, and obsessions with physical appearance for the Bible-hope of the resurrection is an awesome point. I’m going to look at it all differently now, and maybe try to talk to some non-Christians with that as a springboard. Sounds like a door open.”